New Ideas in Psychology

[ Removing Compulsion ] [ Purification ] [ Eliminating Weakness ]

[ Social Abreaction ] [ Examples ]

In the subconscious mind, immorality is often associated with pleasure. Because such pleasure is socially forbidden, it becomes tied to anxiety and guilt. In turn, these emotions help to generate compulsion.

Therefore the process of purifying the subconscious mind involves both releasing this anxiety and bringing the immoral thoughts into normal consciousness. The function of resentment and bitterness is that they remove the attractiveness of forbidden ideas and vain phantasies.

In the abreaction of guilt, the first two stages of narcissism and jealousy generate excitement about immoral and spicy ideas. When these stages are worked through, the stage of guilt is reached. Now feelings of degradation arise concerning the immorality of the catharsis stage. The last stage, that of resentment, highlights the feelings of degradation and rejects all the previous excitement.

Prior to the catharsis, immorality was associated with pleasure (at a subconscious level of mind). During the catharsis this subconscious pleasure is raised to the conscious level of mind. When abreaction is complete, the resentment and bitterness (the bitterness results from the abreaction of pride which follows the abreaction of guilt) have dissociated the pleasure from the immoral thoughts. Anxiety was attached to the memories since to take pleasure in immorality is not socially acceptable. The final result is that both anxiety and pleasure are separated from the aspect of immorality that was the subject of the abreaction. Whence such immoral thoughts no longer bother the person because there are no longer any emotional dynamics in the subconscious mind attached to such thoughts. The person no longer feels guilty about having such thoughts.

In this way, the subconscious mind is gradually purified of compulsive immoral thoughts and the amount of determinism is reduced. The person may still call up immoral phantasies if he / she wants to, but they no longer retain their previous influence over him / her and so will not affect his / her behaviour.

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Copyright © 2002 Ian Heath
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